Tag: Environment

Somehow, I’ve been signed up for the “Stop The Bag Tax” mailing list. And last night I got a call from an opinion research company clearly doing a poll for the anti-bag-tax operation. I’m generally pro-bag-tax, but I hadn’t really done much research, so I decided to look into it. The email directed me to visit StopTheGroceryBagTax.com for more facts. Unfortunately, that domain doesn’t exist. StopTheBagTaxSeattle.com and StopTheSeattleBagTax.com do, however.

Among the “facts” listed there:

+ “Grocery items from big box stores like Wal-Mart and Target? Also could be exempt.”

There isn’t a Wal-Mart in Seattle, which is the city this tax applies to. Good attempt at trying to ride anti-Wal-Mart sentiment, though. And what’s this “could”? Are they exempt, or aren’t they? (Update:not exempt, according to Crosscut.)

+ “Seattle reports 595 bags per person per year (Seattle Public Utilities’ Frequently Asked Questions, page 5). Average “family” nationwide is 3.14 people (source: U.S. Census). Thus average family uses 1,868 bags. At 20 cents per bag, that is $374 per average family per year ($300 to be conservative)”

Isn’t the point of the bag tax that taxing the bags encourages people not to use them? How many of those 595 bags per year only held one item? How many of them would be declined if it cost 20 cents instead of being free? Instead of paying $300/year for disposable bags, wouldn’t people just pay a few bucks for a few reusable bags and… reuse them? (The average family uses over five disposable grocery bags every single day of the year? Wow. That sounds like behavior I’d like to discourage.)

+ “a new tax that tries to force Seattle residents to do what 91% of us are already voluntarily…”

Wait, 91% of us are already reusing and recycling bags, and we’re still getting 595 new bags a year, each? Man, we really need this tax, don’t we? Or an outright ban.

+ “To implement the tax on paper and plastic bags, businesses will have to spend money and time creating a system to track and report the number of grocery bags given out and the tax money collected.”

Too bad there’s no system already in place for tracking and reporting items sold and tax collected at grocery stores. I bet some clever inventor could come up with some sort of device to register purchases made and cash received. Some sort of … cash… register?

So, who are the people who keep emailing, mailing and calling me to tell me how much money I’m going to lose because of this tax? According to stopthebagtaxseattle.com, they are:

Paid for by the Coalition to Stop the Seattle Bag Tax.
Coalition Members:
7-Eleven Inc.
Progressive Bag Affiliates of the American Chemistry Council

Huh. 7-Eleven and manufacturers of plastic bags. But, wait, stoptheseattlebagtax.com has a different list:

The “Coalition to Stop the Seattle Bag Tax” is an alliance of responsible Seattle residents, independent organizations, and business groups who have joined together […]

7-Eleven’s still in there, but where did Progressive Bag Affiliates of the American Chemistry Council go? Surely they aren’t trying to hide the fact that the plastic industry is spending over a million dollars to defeat this tax (compared to around $64,000 being spent by the other side), are they?

Well, at least they’re local, right? I mean, it’s not entirely being run by the plastic industry. It’s being run by… let’s see…

Well, but what about the phone numbers on those domain registrations? They could be local. 866-478-2696 looks like it belongs to Washington Food Industry, a trade association with a membership which “spans from growers to grocers who collaborate to promote the principles of Free Enterprise to ensure a vigorous, competitive, economically healthy food industry.” Sounds good, although I prefer “healthy” to “economically healthy” when it comes to food. And 253-209-5079? That’s the number of Jan Gee, the President/CEO of Washington Food Industry [cite]. It’s also the number of Jan Gee, contact for the 20th Northwest Festival of Clowns. AKA Cupcake the Clown, who specializes in Christian messages for Children and Adults.

I don’t really know what to do with this. The people listed as contacts for the coalition to stop the bag tax are a representative of the plastics industry:

and a Christian clown:

Oh, and http://www.stopthebagtaxseattle.com/? That’s just a frame wrapper around this page, hosted at americanchemistry.com. That’s quite a coalition.

If I hear one more person talking about the “nanny state” when any new government regulation is proposed, I may scream. Look, when the government is trying to protect me from myself, I think there’s a legitimate case to be made that it should butt out. But when it’s trying to protect me from you, that argument doesn’t hold up. If I want to punch myself in the face, fine; if you want to punch me in the face, I’m ok with the government telling you not to.

So: banning smoking in public areas is fine with me. If you want to do that in your own home, be my guest. Taxing disposable grocery bags, similarly ok. Those grocery bags are ending up in trees, in the ocean, in ducks, in my yard, in landfills, pretty much everywhere. Your grocery bags are affecting me. (And mine, when I forget to bring the Acmes, are affecting you.) If the government wants to dissuade you from fucking up the world I live in, that’s ok with me. That it happens to also be protecting you from the consequences of your own actions is immaterial. Your cries of “nanny state” are tedious. Shut the hell up.

A few months ago I posted about the UW’s climate commitment and its use of 2-stroke gas leaf blowers. Today, I took a picture of a groundskeeper cleaning the stairs by the building where I work. I didn’t get a clear photo of the blower itself, but it was definitely a 2-stroke Stihl model, probably a BR420 or BR380. Stihl claims that these models’ catalytic converter results in “reduced emissions”, but I’m having a hell of a time finding out anything more concrete than that. How about some numbers?

And the UW’s Environmental Stewardship Advisory Committee hasn’t responded to the email I sent them in March asking about gas-powered blowers. Hrmf.

The UW already has a strong track record in developing far-reaching plans for reducing energy consumption. It established an Environmental Stewardship Advisory Committee and adopted a Policy on Environmental Stewardship in 2004. The statement says, in part, “The University is committed to practicing and promoting environmental stewardship while conducting its teaching, research, and service missions as well as its facility operations in all of its locations.”

If the UW is a leader in adopting sustainability practices, and if we’ve had an environmental stewardship advisory committee since 2004, why did I see a UW groundskeeper using what appeared to be a two-stroke gas leaf blower to clear a walkway this morning on the way in to work?

It may be that the UW is using more efficient four-stroke blowers, which are said to be five times cleaner than the old two-stroke models. Still, given that a two-stroke engine is putting out about as much pollution as 80 cars, I’m not particularly impressed by a fivefold improvement. That’s still the equivalent of 16 cars. A rake puts out no pollution at all, and I’d be surprised if there were many places on campus where a guy with a rake and pushbroom (or electric blower) couldn’t do at least as good a job of clearing leaves as a guy with a gas blower.

A 2000 report by the California EPA determined that the average residential leaf blower produces 145 times more hydrocarbons, 7.5 times more carbon monoxide, and 11 times more particulate matter in one hour than a 1999-2000 light duty vehicle driven at 30 mph, getting 15 miles to the gallon. The hydrocarbon emissions produced from one-half hour of residential leaf blower operation are equal to the emissions produced from driving 2200 miles, comparable to a round trip from Denver to San Diego. Commercial leaf blowers with more horse power are even more polluting. —ecocycle.org

If President Emmert wants to do something about the UW’s environmental impact, there’s an easy place to start.

Hey, what’s that?A cool google maps application that lets you identify mountain peaks visible from your location. They sent me some code to make my gpx bookmarklet work with their site, which I’ve added.

Kenneth Hite’s Tour de LovecraftKenneth Hite (of the Suppressed Transmission) is writing a post a day about a Lovecraft story in his livejournal. Kenneth Hite is awesome, and if you’re into Lovecraft, this promises to be good.